


Consummation of Grief

by gillasue345



Series: to hell and back [2]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Comfort, F/M, One Night Stand, Plot Twist, Porn with Feelings, Pre-Series, SMUTTY SMUT, Smut, Snuggling, based on line from John Winchester's journal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-24
Updated: 2014-04-24
Packaged: 2018-01-20 15:06:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,569
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1514858
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gillasue345/pseuds/gillasue345
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He’d just come off a sixteen hour stretch on two lane highway that had no passing lanes. As luck would have it, he’d gotten stuck behind a Winnebago that had stickers from every state in the lower forty-eight plastered to the bumper for almost four hours, and he needed a drink. Or three.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Consummation of Grief

**Author's Note:**

> Based off a line in John Winchester's journal on page 98.

Consummation of Grief

 

> I even hear the mountains
> 
> the way they laugh
> 
> up and down their blue sides
> 
> and down in the water
> 
> the fish cry
> 
> and the water
> 
> is their tears.
> 
> I listen to the water
> 
> on nights I drink away
> 
> and the sadness becomes so great
> 
> I hear it in my clock
> 
> it becomes knobs upon my dresser
> 
> it becomes paper on the floor
> 
> it becomes a shoehorn
> 
> a laundry ticket
> 
> it becomes
> 
> cigarette smoke
> 
> climbing a chapel of dark vines. . .
> 
> it matters little
> 
> very little love is not so bad
> 
> or very little life
> 
> what counts
> 
> is waiting on walls
> 
> I was born for this
> 
> I was born to hustle roses down the avenues of the dead.
> 
>  

~Charles Bukowski~

August, 2004

Dean sidled up to the bar, shrugging out of his leather jacket.  He took in the roadside bar, attached to a fleabag motel he’d decided to call home for the night. It was a bleak Wednesday night in southern Utah, and Dean was bone weary, hungry and above all, thirsty. His ears hadn’t stopped popping since Flagstaff. The shift in altitude from southern California to the mountains was never an easy one for Dean. He’d never handled high elevation well, not since he was a child. They always made him irritable.

He’d just come off a sixteen hour stretch on two lane highway that had no passing lanes. As luck would have it, he’d gotten stuck behind a Winnebago that had stickers from every state in the lower forty-eight plastered to the bumper for almost four hours, and he needed a drink. Or three.

The bar was the typical fare, cheap beer, stale peanuts and good tunes. He palmed his pocket for his pack of smokes and his zippo. He lit up, balancing the cigarette between his sunburnt lips. Dean never smoked unless he was drinking and tonight, after the day he’s had, Dean was drinking. The first drag was heaven and he closed his eyes, letting the smoke linger in his lungs.

“Those things’ll kill you,” a smooth voice to his left said, and he cracked his eyes open. A tall woman with deep red hair was taking the seat next to his. He took another drag.

“What doesn’t these days?” he replied, blowing the smoke away from her face.

She nodded, touching her temple lightly. “Touché,” she said. “Truer words have never been spoken.” Dean let his eyes linger over her. She was wearing a low-cut shirt in a shade of blue that matched her eyes and made her pale skin creamy in the dim bar’s lighting.

She smiled crookedly at his attention and looked up at him through her dark red hair. Dean raised his hand, gesturing to the bartender.

“What’re you having?” he asked.

She dipped her head in thanks and told the bartender “Bourbon, neat.”  Dean raised his eyebrows, surprised.

“I have to say… I was expecting something along the lines of a Cosmo.”

She wrinkled her nose. “Never could handle that fruity shit,” she said.

Dean lifted two fingers and the sleepy bartender nodded in his direction.

“I dunno, have you ever had an Arizona sunset?” The woman laughed.

“No, should I?”

“I’m telling you, a buddy of mine got me drunk off of those in upstate New York about a year ago, and they’re  _dangerous_ ,” he said as the bartender set their glasses in front of Dean. “I haven’t had a hangover like that since me and my brother got drunk off of screwdrivers when we were kids.”

Dean slid a glass over to the woman next to him and she held it up. They touched glasses and after she took a liberal sip, she held out her hand.

“I’m Joanna,” she said.

Dean took her hand. Her fingers were soft and cool against his calloused fingertips. “Dean Winchester, nice to meet ya.”

They sipped their drinks quietly for a moment as the song in the juke box changed over. Dean chuckled softly to himself, and Joanna smiled.

Dean hesitated for a fraction of a second, taking a drink. “I used to sing this song to my brother when he wouldn’t go to sleep. It was the only thing that worked.”

“I used to love this song,” she murmured.

Dean glanced over to see that she was frowning, but her clouded features passed by too quickly for him to process why that would make her upset.

He put out the butt of his cigarette in the ashtray in front of him and exhaled the last of the smoke away from Joanna.

“So,” he said, “Who are you drinking to forget tonight?” She looked over sharply, and Dean noticed the way she was playing with her bare ring finger. She bit her lip and looked away.

“Joshua,” she said lightly, but Dean heard something else in her tone. Guilt maybe? Or perhaps even heartache? He took another long swallow of his drink and waved over another round for the two of them.

“Well then I think a toast is in order. Here’s to cheap whiskey and good company,” he touched her glass to his.

“And to Joshua,” she said and Dean smiled.

“How could I have forgotten? And also to Joshua.”

“What about you?” she asked, “You drinking to make new memories or to forget old ones?”  
Dean’s smile faded, but he hid it quickly.

“Can I say both?” he asked.

Joanna smiled, “Sure.”

They downed their shots and ordered another round.

“So where’re you from, handsome?” she asked, moving closer until their knees touched beneath the bar top.

Dean chuckled, pressing back against her knee ever so slightly. “I think the better question is ‘Where aren’t I from?’” he replied.

Joanna laughed and the sound made the pit of his belly warm with anticipation. She had such a distinctive voice. Throaty and soft, with a western lilt that made her r’s rasp.

She did a once over. “Army brat?” she asked.

Dean shrugged. It was the easiest lie. “Close. Marines.”

She nodded. “I thought so.”

“What about you?” he asked before lighting up again. He offered her the pack of cigarettes but she declined.

“Grew up down the highway in Richfield. I’ll prolly die in Richfield, but hey, it’s home right?”

Dean felt a pang of sadness at her words and gripped the worn metal of his amulet against his Henley.

“Yeah,” he said.

“You look like you’re a thousand miles away,” she observed then, placing her hand on top of his on the bar.

“Sorry,” he said, turning his full attention onto her. “So, what you do in good ole’ Richfield Utah?” Dean leaned in, trying to hear or answer over the juke box that was playing an old Elvis song.

“I’m a teacher,” she said.

“How respectable,” Dean murmured under his breath.

“What’s that?” she asked over a loud guitar solo.

“Nothing,” Dean replied. The song finally changed over and he glanced out to an empty space in front of the bar that he assumed was supposed to be a dance floor.

She paused before downing the rest of her drink with a slight wince. “Do you wanna dance?” she asked him and his eyes lit up.

“Yeah,” he replied. “I do.” Dean stood and took her hand. He led her to the dance floor, a hardwood floor surrounded by a parquet border.

They danced slowly, despite the upbeat country tune. Dean brought his hands to her waist, pulling her close; she rested her arms on top of his shoulders. She was tall enough in her cowboy boots to rest her head over his collarbone and Dean could smell strawberry shampoo and some kind of perfume that was spicy with a hint of citrus.

He brought a hand up to the middle of her back and threaded her hair through his fingers. The bar was nearly empty around them, save for an old man sitting in a corner, chain smoking and nursing a beer. There was a young couple in the corner, arguing over some draft pick for the NFL. Dean noticed out of the corner of his eye the way the dark haired man’s fingers trailed lazily over her knee. Dean catalogued these people the way his dad taught him. It was far better to know your surroundings than to be caught with your pants down he always said.

There didn’t seem to be any threat with this lot, however, and Dean let himself relax.

They kept dancing through the end of the next song, and old Eric Clapton tune that Sam hated, but Dean loved. It had a lazy rhythm that made the places where their bodies touched ignite. She let her hands trail over his back, which was tight from the long drive. Her fingernails scraped lightly over the soft short hairs on the back of his neck, sending shivers down his spine.

When the song ended, Dean pulled away and led her back to their seats. They got another round and by this time, Dean was warm and relaxed. Somewhere between the third and fourth rounds, Dean’s fingers had begun tracing lazy patters over the inner seem of her denim clad thighs.

By the fourth round, both of them had become maudlin.

Joanna told Dean about an ex-husband, whom Dean assumed was Joshua, that had slept with her best friend, gotten her pregnant and ran off to start a family he’d refused to give her.

Dean opened up for the first time in years with Joanna, and it may have been the alcohol talking, but not since Lisa had he felt comfortable enough with a woman to tell any semblance of the truth.

He told her about his brother, about going to see him in Palo Alto but being too afraid to actually speak with him after seeing him happy with a leggy blonde with curly hair. She held his hand as he tried to steer the conversation back to a happier place.

By round five, they were kissing heatedly, having moved to a booth in the corner of the dark room.

“Do you want to get outta here?” Joanna whispered in his hear, her lips pressed to the side of his face.

“Hell yeah,” Dean replied. “I got a room next door,” he said and she nodded against his skin.

“That’s a good thing; I want you now” she said lowly.

Dean felt heat ignite all the way down to his fingertips at her words.

Silently, he placed a fifty on the bar top and grabbed her hand.

They made their way out the door and down the short walk to Dean’s room in the western themed motel, only stumbling slightly.

Her fingers were pressed inside the back pocket of his jeans, hooking her thumb around his belt loop. Her breath was hot against his neck and Dean wrapped his hand around the soft flesh of her waist, beneath her becoming blue shirt.

They didn’t quite make it to his room. Dean pulled her to him in the alleyway between the motel and the bar. He leaned against the wall, the cold brick bracing against the worn leather of his jacket. She rested between his thighs. Fistfuls of her air was clenched lightly between his hands as they kissed.

They slowed down then, Joanna pressed herself tightly against him and they kissed lazily, fingers pressing gently, hips rocking slowly. Dean’s tight back and tired limbs were forgotten.

His ears popped painfully again and he groaned against her lips.

They broke apart at the sound of a horn honking to their right. Dean laughed and they stumbled along the uneven sidewalk to his room.

As they passed the Impala, Joanna let out a low whistle of appreciation.

“She’s a thing of beauty,” she said and he smiled wide.

“I just rebuilt her engine,” he said prideful.

Dean opened the trunk while she admired the front grill. He retrieved his brown leather duffle and palmed a couple of condoms from the box in the corner of the trunk. He put them into his jacket pocket and they walked towards the blue door of his motel room.

Dean tossed the duffle onto the Formica table and turned towards Joanna.

He crossed his arms and leaned against the wall between the window and the door, just watching as she took in the wood paneled monstrosity of the room.

“Oh God,” she said. “Could they have gotten any more cliché with the décor in here?” She picked at a woolen Navajo blanket, stained red with years of dirt, at the end of the bed in distaste. She glanced over at him and her eyes darkened. Joanna stepped closer to Dean until their breaths were mingling. She shrugged off her light denim jacket and tossed it aside.

Dean smirked as she pressed her hands to his chest to toe clumsily out of her cowboy boots. She stumbled slightly and reached out to catch her and she smiled wide, letting him support her as she kicked off her shoes. He laughed and pulled her close as soon as she was in her socks. He wrapped his big hands around her delicate face. Her pale skin was flushed and warm beneath his hands.

Her hair was so soft, Dean thought. He played with it absently and she let her fingers trail over his shoulders. She pulled his jacket off his shoulders and he pulled away long enough for her to toss it over her shoulder next to the bed.

He kicked off his own boots and they staggered to the bed. He laughed as they fell backwards, landing hard on the slightly moldy comforter.

She giggled, her voice low and throaty as she climbed up his body to straddle his waist. As she removed her becoming blue shirt, Dean took it from her and tossed it next to her jacket, leaving her in jeans, a pink lace bra and mismatched socks. Dean pulled back then, just looking at her.

He traced her soft jaw and small lips. Dean brushed away a wayward strand of her hair and let his calloused fingertips brush lightly over the very light freckles on the bridge of her button nose.

 _She’s beautiful_ , he thought. Joanna shifted her hips up and Dean bit back a moan.

There was just something about a woman being on top that had always hit just the right buttons for him. He liked feeling surrounded by them, their hair brushing against his chest as they moved together.

He sat up slightly to kiss her collarbone, entranced by the way the sharp bone created shadows in the dim motel lighting.

When his fingers brushed against the tattoo beneath her left rib, she sucked in a breath. And Dean paused to examine it.

It was a simple tattoo of an impossibly small foot print in black ink followed by a series of dates one week apart and a name.

Dean stopped and met her gaze. Her chin jutted forward in defiance, but there was vulnerability, a desperation in her shining eyes. She clenched her fists in the folds of his shirt and nodded.

He didn’t even think, he just acted, cradling her face in his hands.

One tear spilled over, falling down her cheek and he kissed it away. Dean turned them over then. He kissed a path down her body, across the worn lace bow on her bra between her breasts, over a birthmark the size of a penny on her tummy. He let his fingers trace the tattoo beneath her rib before moving up to palm her breast.

Joanna was trembling. Dean looked up from where he was kissing her jutting hipbone to the flesh of her soft flesh of her stomach where a small scar rested against the waistband of her jeans.

They were both breathing heavily. He traced his fingers along the pink scar and met her gaze.

“Is this what you want?” he asked. His voice was tight, wrecked.

Joanna nodded emphatically. “Yes,” she said, and pulled him up to her. “Yes,” she said again, their breaths mingling as her words touched his lips. She wrapped her legs around his hips and hastily pushed his Henley up, revealing bruised ribs, a courtesy of his last hunt. She kissed his chest and brushed her tongue over his nipple as Dean moaned above her.

They moved quickly then. Dean pulled back and grabbed one of the condoms from his discarded jacket as Joanna unbuttoned her jeans. He stopped her when she went to remove them, however, and instead grabbed the waistband himself. He removed her jeans, then her mismatched socks, kissing her ankle in the process and leaving her in a pair of simple black panties and her bra. He brushed his fingers over the soft fabric, eliciting a hiss from her. There was a small dark patch, where her arousal had wet the fabric through, and she bit her lip making it bleed, at the touch.

He paused for only a moment before slipping them off. She lifted her hips to help him as he slid them down her thighs and then tossed them to the end of the bed.

Dean removed his own jeans then. His erection popped free from the worn fabric of his boxer-briefs as he watched her unhook her bra and throw it behind her. They were both kneeling in the center of the bed by the time they had finally removed all of their clothing. Dean unwrapped the condom and put it on.

Joanna was sucking a bruise into his neck as he gently pressed her back onto the mattress, letting his thumb rest in the soft place beneath her breast, over her rib. She lay back and he began to trail kisses down her freckled stomach once more, towards the soft hair at the parting of her legs. She moaned as he sucked a bruise into her hipbone.

“Tit for tat,” Dean murmured and Joanna’s fingers pressed hard against the bruise she had kissed into his collarbone.

He thumbed a pressure point behind her knee and she moaned loudly.

This was the part Dean had always loved the most, the buildup, the soft touches and breathy sighs as he brought his partner pleasure. He let a finger sink into her slick opening as he kissed her inner thigh, his stubble sending sharp jolts of pleasure/pain straight to Joanna’s core. Her fingers gripped tightly in his hair as his mouth joined his hand, licking a long swipe between the slick folds of her entrance. He worked in another finger as he sucked hard on her clit, swirling his tongue around it until she moaned again.

She gasped hard as his fingers curled up and scraped his scalp with her manicured nails.

Dean groaned. His scalp had always been very sensitive. The vibrations of his moan sent a jolt of pleasure down her spine and she arched up, clenching her thighs around his ears. His nose hit her pubic bone and she gasped again.

He added a third finger, pumping them slowly, in time with the long strokes of his tongue. She was writhing beneath him and he could feel her heartbeat in the fingers that continued to brush against the walls of her entrance.

Dean pressed his other hand to his erection, stroking the shaft very lightly. Her hips met the timing of his hand, speeding up, and with a long moan Joanna stilled beneath him, coming hard around his fingers. He stilled his hand but not his mouth, sucking hard on her clit as she rode out the orgasm.

When it was over she laughed and pulled Dean up her body. She kissed him hard and grabbed his cock, her cool fingers slid over the thin latex of the condom and he bit back a moan. She flipped them over then, straddling his waist. She grabbed his wrists and pulled them over his head and smirked at Dean’s shocked expression. She ground her hips into his, and his eyes slipped shut at the sensation.

She hitched herself up and onto his erection then, sliding down slowly until he was buried to the hilt inside her.

They stopped, breathing heavily, and locked eyes. His pupils were blow and his cheeks were flushed, bringing out his freckles. She released his hands and they immediately moved to her hips, guiding her as she rocked against him. They set a slow pace, each on chasing pleasure, holding off on the inevitable as long as possible. Her strokes were even and measured, and every other thrust Dean hit that sweet spot deep within her. She moaned, well on her way to a second orgasm.

Dean knew he wouldn’t last much longer. He brought a hand between their bodies, slipping two fingers around her clit. Her eyes popped open in shock or pleasure and she moved more quickly, their pace rough and uneven now.

“Oh fuck,” she moaned as she came again, clenching around him, her thighs shuddered, spasming against his hips.

Then she went limp above him. Dean grabbed her hips and thrust hard, chasing his own release. Her body was loose and soft around him.

This was by far the best sex he’d had in weeks, maybe months, and when Joanna opened her lust-blown eyes and reached out, cupping his face between her hands, Dean came hard, with a low shout, stilling completely inside her as come streamed into the condom.

She collapsed down onto him then, keeping their bodies connected as she pressed her lips to his sweaty chest.

They stay like that for a few minutes until Dean pulled out gently, noticing the way she winced only slightly.

Dean removed the condom and tied it off. He stood from the bed and threw it away in the wastebasket as padded to the bathroom where he found a washcloth.

He wet it with warm water and wrung it out, wiping himself down as he tiptoed back to the bedroom.

Before making it to the bed, Dean reached down and picked up his boxer-briefs. He slipped them on and climbed into the bed, where Joanna was sprawled out on her stomach, he sheet tangled between her knees.

He let his fingers trail over her smooth back and she jerked at his touch then relaxed. He brought the warm cloth between her legs and gently cleaned her up.

When he was finished, he tossed the cloth onto the floor and lay down next to her. She scooted over, letting him pull her close. He breathed in her strawberry shampoo, mixed with the smell of sweat, and smoke, and sex. He traced his fingers over her tattoo in the dark.

They breathed quietly in tandem.

After a moment, Joanna moved to the edge of the bed, making as if to stand.

“Hey, hey where’re you going, sweetheart?” he asked, wrapping an arm around her waist, trapping her against his side, his thumb tracing over her cesarean scar.

She laughed, “Chill out, just going to the bathroom,” she whispered. “You haven’t gotten rid of me yet, sugar.” She joked.

“Good, cuz even though I would deny it til my last breath, this is my favorite part,” Joanna softened against him. She sat up and turned around; she traced a finger over his nose.

“I’ll be right back,” she kissed him, and he tried to deepen the kiss, but she pulled back.

On the way to the bathroom, she bent down and Dean whistled at her backside.

She flipped him off and picked up her panties and his Henley. Dean watched her lithe frame disappear behind the bathroom door.

He lay back, staring at a crack in the plaster of his room’s ceiling. His eyes drifted in and out of focus until the crack in the ceiling was suddenly the shape of a wolf howling up at the sky, then a jagged mountain top, or maybe a bolt of lightning. His eyes drifted shut.

Suddenly the long day caught up to him, and he felt his body relax into the uncomfortable mattress.

The bathroom door opened and the light switched off. Dean cracked open one eye to see Joanna tiptoeing towards the bed. His Henley brushed the tops of her thighs, just above a dark freckle on her left knee.

Dean felt something constrict inside his chest. This was all he wanted, a warm bed with a sweet, beautiful woman wearing his clothes and tiptoeing towards him with a shy glance.

He lifted the covers and shifted as she climbed in, wrapping herself around him until she was the big spoon, their legs tangled.

Dean brought a hand down her arm until their fingers were clasped together, she twirled her finger around his hair.

He’d been meaning to get it cut; the rawhead he’d been hunting earlier that week had damn near scalped him. In the absence of his brother, Dean had tried growing his hair out, and while it definitely seemed to work in his sex life, it was impractical for the job. He decided to check out the barber shop he’d passed on his way into town the following morning.

But right now, right now it just felt good to feel her fingers through his hair. He sighed.

The alcohol was wearing off now, leaving a slight pounding behind his eyes and a dry mouth.

“His name was Joshua,” she said, her voice quiet in the dark. “I had him for a week.”

Dean didn’t say anything. He pulled her closer.

“I went into labor at twenty four weeks, and he just… he just wasn’t ready to be born yet.”

“I’m sorry for your loss,” Dean whispered. He didn’t know what else to say.

“They… they let me hold him as he left this world… at least I have that right?” she chuckled bitterly, “The first time I held him was the last time.”

“I’m sure—” he began, but she stiffened. Dean snapped his mouth shut.

“Don’t say it. Don’t say he’s ‘in a better place.’ Please,” her voice broke and Dean shifted then, until she was wrapped around him, her face against his chest.

They lay in silence.

“Sometimes,” she started, but then she choked back a sob. “Sometimes, I still think he’s here with me. It’s a burden I can never put down.”

“The ones we lose never really leave us,” he murmured.

“Sometimes I wonder what I am. Am I still a mother, if I have no child?”

“Yes,” Dean whispered, almost too low for her to hear. “You are; you always will be.”

“It doesn’t feel like it,” her eyelashes brushed against his chest and she cleared his throat. “So who did you lose?” she asked, obviously trying to shift the topic away from Joshua.

 _Who haven’t I lost?_ Dean thought. “My mom,” he said after a moment’s hesitation. Once the dam was broken he found he didn’t want to stop. “She died in a fire when I was four, and… and my dad was never the same.”

“I’m sorry,” she said.

“In a lot of ways… he died right along with her.” Dean pulled her close. “He couldn’t— he couldn’t let her go, and because of it…” Dean stopped, guilt swirling in the pit of his stomach.

“What, Dean?”

“My dad has spent his whole life since then tracking down the… monster that killed her.”

“He still hasn’t found him?”

Dean shook his head in the dark. “Sometimes I wonder if we ever will.”

“I’m sorry,” she said again and somehow, her simple empathy was enough to loosen the knot of anxiety in her belly.

“It was so long ago… I can barely remember what her voice sounded like when she sang me to sleep.”

There was a pause. “But I bet you remember what she sang though.”

Dean smiled into her hair. “I couldn’t forget it if I tried.”

Joanna yawned. “What was it?” she asked.

“Hey Jude,” he whispered, and she felt her lips press against his chest. He threaded his fingers into the folds of his Henley, feeling her warm skin jerk beneath his shirt.

Then she began to sing. She took his hand as she murmured the song into his chest and for the first time in a long time, Dean felt content, safe.

He fell asleep with a smile on his lips and a sweet low voice in his ear.

Sometime in middle of the night Dean woke up to their bodies tangled together, and her eyes heavy and dark above him.

They made love again, slow and lazy, both of them still half asleep.

And when Dean awoke the next morning, he was alone. There was a note on the other pillow, written in a sloppy hand.

             _Thank you, Dean. J._

There was a heart scrawled beneath the ‘J.’ Dean ran a hand through his hair and chalked up the disappointed churn in his gut to nothing more than nausea from his hangover.

As he stumbled to the bathroom, he looked for his shirt, but didn’t find it anywhere. He figured that Joanna had swiped it and that left him feeling bittersweet. It had been his favorite shirt.

Dean checked the rest of his belongings out of habit, and found everything accounted for. He packed up his room after a quick shower and headed towards downtown. He was ready to leave the mountains. He winced once more as his ears popped painfully again.

After a quick haircut at the barber shop he stepped into the diner next door for a greasy breakfast, a perfect cure for the churning in his gut.

He didn’t notice the unused condom in his pocket until he went to pay the check.

At the time, he’d shrugged it off, put the condom in his wallet and went about the rest of his day.

****

April, 2014

Ten years later, however, as he stood face to face with Joanna in a restaurant in Richfield Utah, with a little girl standing next to her in the line for the check, Dean thought he probably should have been a little bit more concerned about that unused condom.

Dean had seen her out of the corner of his eye and froze. Joanna hadn’t recognized him; she smiled in his direction distractedly as she guided her daughter forward in the line to the counter, but then she stopped. Her hand tightened on the little girl’s shoulder.

Dean stared at the girl in wide-eyed terror. She had blonde hair that was tied back with a polka dotted bow and hazel eyes, with a heavily bowed lip and dark freckles over her nose, cheeks and forehead.

Dean tried to catch Joanna’s eye but she just shook her head tightly and directed her daughter back to their table.

“Dee, honey, why don’t you go get Daddy and we’ll go to the lake,” Dee smiled wide, and Dean noticed the gap where one of her front teeth should have been.

“Okay Mama,” she said; her voice sounded like music and Dean began to panic. His hand started sweating and his heart began to race. Dee skipped towards a table where a man with black hair was feeding an equally dark-haired toddler.

Joanna cleared her throat. Just then, Sam emerged from the hallway leading to the bathrooms.

“Dean,” he said, as he unwrapped a piece of gum. “We gotta go if we’re gonna meet up with Cas…” Sam trailed off as noticed the red-haired woman next to Dean. “Uh,” he said, quirking an eyebrow at his brother.

“Sam… this is Joanna,” Dean began awkwardly. “Joanna, this is my brother, Sam.”

Joanna held out her hand. “It’s nice to meet you Sam,” she said tightly.

“You too,” he replied, shaking her hand. “So are you uh… and old friend of Dean’s?” he asked.

Joanna smiled. “Something like that.”

“Well… I should prolly go fill up the car, you good?” Sam asked and Dean nodded subtly.

“I’ll be right behind you,” he said and Sam left the restaurant.

Dean cleared his throat. He watched the way Joanna toyed with her ring finger. “So uh, Dee, huh?” he said putting his hands in his pockets.

She grimaced. “It’s short for Deanna,” she said finally.

Dean bit his lip and looked up at the ceiling. “You weren’t divorced when we met, were you?” he asked, resigned.

Joanna bit her lip and shook her head. “I’m sorry, Dean,” she began, but he cut her off.

“I get it okay?” he reached out and touched her shoulder. “I do,” he paused for just a moment and looked over at the little girl playing peekaboo with her little brother. “You have a lovely family,” he whispered as he bent to kiss her cheek.

“Please understand…” she began.

“I really do. It’s okay,” he pulled back then. “Goodbye Joanna,” he said. Joanna smiled tightly and then she was gone.

He passed by their table on his way out the door.

“Who was that guy?” the man asked as she searched in her purse for a tip.

She smiled, “Just someone I used to know,” she said. “He helped me through a tough time once…”

Dean shut the door behind him; the last thing he heard was the chime of the bell on the door handle, and his father’s voice in his ear.

_“If you’re not careful son, you’re gonna leave a string of kids and arrest warrants across the country…”_

 

 

 

 


End file.
